Tweet
Thai Female Elite Demand Black Gigolos
Zenitha Prince
The long-perpetrated image of the black man as a sexual toy continues to flourish as the niche market for black male prostitutes in Thailand booms.
Escort services are now importing hundreds of prospective black gigolos from Jamaica and Africa into the Asian country to satisfy the surge in the demand for these services among the Thai female elite.
A research project, recently completed by Associate Professor of Sociology Nither Tinnakul, from the Bangkok's Chulalongkorn University, puts the number of male prostitutes in Thailand at a staggering 30,000, triple the estimated amount of just two years ago.
Among the reasons for this phenomenon, cited in an Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) interview, are the lingering effects of the Asian economic crisis and the women's need for revenge against their philandering husbands.
"I think the women want some equal rights you know, some kind of freedom. She needs something," Tinnakul said.
Apparently, this is a need that these black foreign prostitutes or "forungs" have aptly satisfied. The report further stated that Thai women are paying upwards of 10,000 baht (243 dollars) per night for the servicers, who are "fiercer", more "thrilling" in bed than their Thai peers and "well built."
Such comments have triggered a fierce reaction from black men who live in the capital and have elicited several accusations of racial stereotyping. Christopher Thorpe, a 20-year-old Electrical Engineering major at Morgan State University opined, "It is interesting when you look at the way black males are viewed as aggressive, virile lovers in society, but that is all we are seen as; we're not seen as intelligent, progressive or caring. These same women who would pay [black men] for sex are those who ascribe to the same stereotype that we are violent and a general menace to society."
Another Morganite senior Aisha Goodridge felt that the issue went just beyond black men. "This is not surprising; it goes with the myth that women of different cultures believe that black men have a lot of sexual prowess," she said. "I do not feel particularly degraded because it is a black man; it is just another sad degradation and I would have felt the same if it was a man of another rae."
The issue has also scandalized Thais; since in paying for the favors of these men, Thai women are defying tradition. An Agence France Presse article reported that a top politician asserted that all the hoopla about foreign gigolos raised by Tinnakul's report was undermining the family and making men suspicious of their wives. In response to the backlash engendered by his report, however, Tinnakul attributed the uproar to the uncovering of what is otherwise viewed as a taboo subject.
"This exist in the Thai society, you have to have the subject – just look at the English newspaper for example. You look at advertising, you will find lots of advertising about this kind of job," he said in the ABC interview. "[This topic is not talked about] because this is something—people don't think it exists in Thai society, or maybe think it's not a good thing to talk about it."
Zenitha Prince
The long-perpetrated image of the black man as a sexual toy continues to flourish as the niche market for black male prostitutes in Thailand booms.
Escort services are now importing hundreds of prospective black gigolos from Jamaica and Africa into the Asian country to satisfy the surge in the demand for these services among the Thai female elite.
A research project, recently completed by Associate Professor of Sociology Nither Tinnakul, from the Bangkok's Chulalongkorn University, puts the number of male prostitutes in Thailand at a staggering 30,000, triple the estimated amount of just two years ago.
Among the reasons for this phenomenon, cited in an Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) interview, are the lingering effects of the Asian economic crisis and the women's need for revenge against their philandering husbands.
"I think the women want some equal rights you know, some kind of freedom. She needs something," Tinnakul said.
Apparently, this is a need that these black foreign prostitutes or "forungs" have aptly satisfied. The report further stated that Thai women are paying upwards of 10,000 baht (243 dollars) per night for the servicers, who are "fiercer", more "thrilling" in bed than their Thai peers and "well built."
Such comments have triggered a fierce reaction from black men who live in the capital and have elicited several accusations of racial stereotyping. Christopher Thorpe, a 20-year-old Electrical Engineering major at Morgan State University opined, "It is interesting when you look at the way black males are viewed as aggressive, virile lovers in society, but that is all we are seen as; we're not seen as intelligent, progressive or caring. These same women who would pay [black men] for sex are those who ascribe to the same stereotype that we are violent and a general menace to society."
Another Morganite senior Aisha Goodridge felt that the issue went just beyond black men. "This is not surprising; it goes with the myth that women of different cultures believe that black men have a lot of sexual prowess," she said. "I do not feel particularly degraded because it is a black man; it is just another sad degradation and I would have felt the same if it was a man of another rae."
The issue has also scandalized Thais; since in paying for the favors of these men, Thai women are defying tradition. An Agence France Presse article reported that a top politician asserted that all the hoopla about foreign gigolos raised by Tinnakul's report was undermining the family and making men suspicious of their wives. In response to the backlash engendered by his report, however, Tinnakul attributed the uproar to the uncovering of what is otherwise viewed as a taboo subject.
"This exist in the Thai society, you have to have the subject – just look at the English newspaper for example. You look at advertising, you will find lots of advertising about this kind of job," he said in the ABC interview. "[This topic is not talked about] because this is something—people don't think it exists in Thai society, or maybe think it's not a good thing to talk about it."
but dangerous to life and limb! 
Comment